progressingamerica

Saturday, September 23, 2017

Social reform requires big government. Big government requires an obedient court, which fosters a "living constitution". In "Social reform and the Constitution", progressive reformer Frank Johnson Goodnow wrote the following regarding the courts: (page 31)

The result is that the constitutional law of the country is not, either necessarily or actually, uniform. For a state court may declare unconstitutional from the point of view of the federal constitution an act of a state legislature which would have been regarded as constitutional by the United States Supreme Court. If, therefore, the state courts are more conservative than the Supreme Court, and many believe they are, they determine finally what is, in a particular state, the effect of the limitations of the federal constitution upon state action. This condition of things is, however, not one which need be permanent, nor one which can be changed only through constitutional amendment. For the jurisdiction of the federal courts is in these matters entirely within the control of Congress, which may constitutionally provide, if it sees fit to do so, that all cases both civil and criminal involving a federal question may be removed to the federal courts, and that appeals may go to the Supreme Court from all decisions of the state courts of last instance, whether they affirm or not the constitutionality of state laws.

Therefore, from a constitutional point of view, the attitude of the Supreme Court of the United States is the only really important thing to consider when we are treating of the permanent constitutional obstacles to social reform in the United States. On that account, what will be said as to the effect on the possibilities of such reform of the limitations contained in the federal constitution will in the main be confined to a consideration of the attitude of the Supreme Court towards these questions.

Our attention will naturally be directed, first to an examination of the powers of the Congress of the United States, as they are to be derived from a consideration of the provisions of the constitution as interpreted by the Supreme Court, and particularly to those clauses which contain the power to regulate commerce and the judicial power. For it is almost only through the exercise of these powers that any great centralization of our government may be secured.

This is something that progressives have long known, and it is exactly why the devised the scheme of a "living constitution". The supreme court is their holy grail institution for enforcing views upon Americans that Americans do not want and would not vote for on election day. Woodrow Wilson and others have plainly written about the need to get the courts separated from the Constitution and interpreting it in ways never intended.

Subvert and destroy. The progressives knew fully well what they had to do. And their primary target? The commerce clause. This book was written in 1911, only three years after Woodrow Wilson first floated the idea that the constitution should be reinterpreted as a living thing.

Sunday, September 17, 2017

Far too often, articles or books are written about how bad the 16th amendment is(which it absolutely is) but then the authors turn around and point to Woodrow Wilson. This is historical malpractice. It is said that 42 states ratified the 16th amendment, and 40 of those did so prior to March 4, 1913, which was when Wilson was inaugurated. Massachusetts ratified the 16th on the same day, March 4th, and New Hampshire followed a few days later on March 7th.

So let me get this straight: Woodrow Wilson as president was so strong and powerful that he reached back in his time machine and got all 40 of those states to ratify, before his inauguration. Do I have that about right?

So how is it that so many conservatives get this so wrong?

It's because the amendment was finalized in 1913, in part. How vacuous is that? Its easy to point to the year and dissemble about the rest.

The real reason why, I suspect, is because any amount of research leads to Theodore Roosevelt. You don't even have to scratch the surface with anything more tough than a piece of balsa wood and TR's name comes popping out. There are a lot of people who want to do something about progressivism, but they become ardent progressivism defenders once the facts get presented and TR's duplicity is proven. This one guy for whatever reason, he has a license for big government that's granted to him by constitutionalists. It's the strangest contradiction.

Well, let's get to the history. There were two efforts to get an income tax within a roughly 10 year period, but the first one failed in a court case so I will primarily focus on the second.

With the failure of the first income tax in the 1895 Pollock case, the progressives let a little time pass so as to let people get lulled back to sleep. The progressives will often times do that - they never give up on their ideas because of course progressivism is perfect, they'll just come back again later when you are convinced it is over. Following that 12 year period of time, the first time Roosevelt talked about the income tax that I am aware of was in his 1907 State of the Union address. That's not an obscure speech. He said:

When our tax laws are revised the question of an income tax and an inheritance tax should receive the careful attention of our legislators. In my judgment both of these taxes should be part of our system of Federal taxation.

Interesting. Not only did TR support the income tax, but I just learned something brand new today. Theodore Roosevelt also supported the death tax. I'll leave that one for another day.

Theodore Roosevelt's presidency concluded in 1908, and his hand picked successor William Howard Taft, continued TR's drive for the income tax by giving a major speech in 1909 which kicked off the move for the 16th amendment. After that, the states started their ratifications in the second half of 1909. During the 1912 presidential campaign and while the states were still individually ratifying the amendment, Roosevelt repeatedly spoke in support for the income tax.

The two most notable moments during the campaign (likely) were the inclusion of the graduated tax in the 1912 progressive party platform, Roosevelt's party, and in what is most likely Roosevelt's best known and perhaps important speech: The New Nationalism.(1912)

So, the point is this: History and the facts force us to blame progressive republicans for the 16th amendment in general and Theodore Roosevelt in particular. He was the first president to push for it, the first former president to push for it, the first presidential candidate to push for it, and it was his hand picked successor who got the ball rolling in congress. Wilson, a guy who doubled down on nearly all of Roosevelt's big government proposals and policies, came into office four days after the entire multi-year cause(1907-1913) would come to a successful end.

Four days. Yeah, it's clearly Wilson's fault. There's no love lost for Wilson around here, check my archives. But we have GOT to get the history correct. Wilson does not own this one, Theodore Roosevelt is to blame for the 16th amendment and the income tax.

Friday, September 8, 2017

As I have written in the past, Progressivism would not exist at all if not for Henry George. John Dewey was influenced by George, many of the British Fabians, Margaret Sanger; one of the most proud proclaimations of progressive achievement in the early 20th century is Initiative, Referendum, and Recall - that entire movement was based on Georgist ideals (and dishonest ones at that.) The early unions, many of them were not socialist, they were Georgist. The Knights of Labor, Samuel Gompers, and others.

But understanding the link between big government and Henry George is not well understood. The fact that George repeatedly agitated for the nationalization of land typically falls on deaf ears. One of the most prominent members of the so-called "Social Gospel", Walter Rauschenbusch, is another who was deeply moved by the politics of Henry George. Rauschenbusch once gave a speech in which he proclaimed:

Mr. George has taught this proposition in his book. He is often called a socialist, but it is very incorrect to call him so; he is not a socialist, but the strongest opponent of socialism in the United States. He is a strong advocate of laissez faire in the highest sense of that term. Therefore he insists that artificial monopolies, such as the tariff, should be swept away, and that freedom should be given to the natural forces of society, and that natural monopolies should be owned and managed by the community to which they naturally belong. These are his propositions in regard to monopoly. Am I right?

By "his book" Rauschenbusch means "Progress and Poverty", George's most well known work.

Now, just earlier this week I pointed out that Progressives do not (and I believe they cannot; they are impaired from doing so) distinguish between "Government" and "Society". For a progressive, society is government and government is society. This speech from Rauschenbusch is no different. Reading the speech, he repeatedly uses "community", "society" and "the State"(and other synonyms) completely interchangeably.

For Rauschenbusch, natural monopolies need to be owned by the big organization of society i.e. government. He doesn't mean shareholders, read his speech. That's not his tone and its not his content. Besides, ownership by only the shareholders does not encompass an entire community. The only way "society" or "the community" can be the owners and managers is if the state at some level begins nationalizing property.

Which is what George was known for supporting anyways, at least in regards to land. It's clear what Rauschenbusch is talking about and clear who he is citing as his inspiration.

Monday, September 4, 2017

In his book "The Principles of Sociology", Edward Alsworth Ross wrote the following: (page 267)

In the management of common affairs there is much to be said for the general as against the local political body. Too often local control sacrifices general and permanent interests to individual and immediate interests. Local control of education leaves its fate on the whole to men of less caliber and vision than those who determine it under state control. Local care of highways means less outlay on the roads of the commonwealth than sound economy demands. Local administration of forests or care of public health will generally be less enlightened than that of the state. Law enforcement by locally chosen officers permits each locality to be a law unto itself. In a word removing control farther from the ordinary citizen and taxpayer is tantamount to giving the intelligent, farsighted, and public-spirited element in society a longer lever to work with.

Note: Progressives hate the 50 states. They would nationalize everything if they had the chance. When he says "the state" he does not mean one of the 50.

That's why progressives hate taxpayers so much. You are arrogant enough to think you have a say. The progressives genuinely believe they're better than you: more enlightened, farsighted, and public-spirited. That's what gives them the right to centrally plan and control every aspect of your life, you see.

Additionally, this is why progressives always move on toward bigger and bigger government. Making government big in the individual states was bound to be not big enough. Once they found Nationalism, that lasted for them for all of about a decade or two. If progressives had the ability to move on to Intergalacticism, they'd drop Globalism in a heartbeat.

Even Theodore Roosevelt advocated for global government, he was the first one. Progressives lust after big government. It turns them on in a sick, twisted way.

Saturday, September 2, 2017

Society is society. Government is government. They are two entirely distinct, and completely separate things.

Not in the land of Progressivism, however. For progressives, society is government and government is society. They are equally the same and there is no possible distinction. You can routinely see the rotting husk of this when someone proceeds to inform you that "they believe society should do x or y" but when talking of x or y they are instead referring to government action. "I believe that we as a society should take care of the poor, and that's why I support {insert name of welfare program here}".

But sir, you're not talking about society when you made that statement. You specifically excluded society from that statement, and you inserted government.

How can it be that progressives get this so wrong? It all goes back to the word "social". That's the key. Progressives are collectivists, which means that they are incapable of truly interpreting individual action and moreover, they suspect individual action. They have contempt for it. How often have you heard that one man cannot make a difference?

In the progressive's mind, humans are a "social" animal. Now, a progressive wants you to believe that when they say humans are "social" animals, that they merely mean you like to sit at Starbucks and shake people's hands, talk of sports and trifle things, exchange stories of yours and others' families and friends. You're being sociable! That's not what they mean. They have a dual word definition here. They mean collectivism, which is far more sinister. And you can easily prove it. So by "social justice" what they mean is "Starbucks justice"? It's a nonsensical thing. Of course they do not mean that. But if you were to say, "collective justice" - Now you're on to something.

Now, how do I know all off this is true? It's all in the progressives writings. Some progressives are more descriptive than others, but one progressive, Lester Ward, really sums this up well. In his book "Applied sociology: a treatise on the conscious improvement of society by society", he writes the following: (page 337)

When we say that society does anything we mean of course that it does it according to some settled method of social action. Society of course is an abstraction, but it is one of those abstractions that are always doing something. Society always possesses an organization, and it is this organization that acts. It would be as reasonable to object to the statement that an army does anything. An army is an abstraction in the same sense that society is such. It is an organization capable of doing much, and this is all that is meant by the action or the work of society.

Now, note how many times you see the word 'society' in his paragraph. I count 5. That's just one paragraph! But note what the title of this section is (for those of you who clicked the link) - Attractive Legislation!! And more of page content talks about representatives, he talks about the Russian government, autocracies, and much more.

He is thoroughly using the words 'society' and 'government' interchangeably here. All progressives that I know of do this. This is one of the biggest issues of all why progressives cannot understand and do not like America.

So, here is the formula: (Note again, the passage I quoted from Ward)

Society possesses an organization. Society's organization is an organization that acts. Therefore, government is society. They are one in the same. There may not be anything more foundational than this for progressivism. This also explains why progressives get so much other things wrong.

Why does a corporation exist? Well obviously, a corporation exists to create jobs. It's a social organization, and society has organizations in order to do things. Society has organizations that act. But, but, but! Let's not forget, that all corporations are subjugated to the one true societal organization that acts. That's why government must control corporations. Society's acting organization makes proxies out of these other little acting organizations.

And what of non profit organizations? How many of them do nothing but political activities? In order to build up the organization of all organizations, government, non profits are completely justified in organizing dead voters, organizing illegals, Mickey Mouse and Mary Poppins are registered voters; - did you vote three times? Vote again! Whomever and whatever and however the big organization of society can make the big organization bigger, it is all justified. Big government is purity.

What of churches? Or should I say, social churches/social religion. No, churches are not places for you to worship your Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ! That's bigotry. The real magic of churches is that they are a great club! Yeah, and from churches we can make government bigger! It's the big organization of society. Churches don't need to do anything, they don't need to be charitable, we can have government do it all.

And what about individual charity? Why is it that progressives are the least charitable individuals on the planet, but act as if they are the most charitable and YOU are the greedy sob? It's because you only gave a couple thousand dollars. The progressive? They gave millions and billions and trillions of dollars in charity. You couldn't have possibly have given more than they did. But if you would just give all of your money to society, to the big organization that acts, you could be charitable too.

This also explains how it is that progressives come to see all of us as groups. You Christians over there, you unemployed over here, you have groups of hispanics, and the this group and the that group and the Rotarians, the Moose and the Elks, there's the gays, the employed, union members and non-union members, and any other group you can name. All groups are equal you know. We are all groups in the big organization of society.

It all stems from the fact that they, the progressives, do not see society as distinct from government. They see them as exactly the same.

What of our Founding documents? To a progressive, our founding documents are a great contradiction. Perhaps, the ultimate contradiction. You want "we the people" but you also want government limited? This cannot be! For the progressive, government is the people. Government is society. Government is everything. "We the people" means to the progressive that the American government needs to be the biggest government ever known in the history of mankind.

But those of us who are not collectivists, we see "we the people" and we realize "yes, ---------->I must do these things. Me. I should not be lazy, I should get off the couch, I should not wait for someone else to do it. I shouldn't connive some trick to get government to do it. I should do it. Right now. Because me, because I, because of my individual action, I am making society better".

And you can see this in play in real life. What happens when progressives protest? The scene gets trashed, people get raped, graffiti painted, and police cars get defecated on. Heck, even sometimes bombs get thrown.(See Weather Underground) Who cares, government will clean the paint off, put the fires out.

But what happened at the Tea Parties? The grounds were cleaner when the Tea Partiers left than when they first arrived. Why is this?

It's because of the individual making society better, despite government. I can speak to this first hand because I did this myself. I didn't wait for some park ranger or government official to walk by and clean up that empty paper cup for me. I bent over all by myself, picked up that paper cup, and I walked over and threw it in the trash without having to be told to do so.

I did it because it was the right thing to do. It wasn't my trash. But so what? It needed to be done. Progressives do not think this way. That's society's job. (That's government's job. See what I mean.)

"We the people" wasn't a celebration of the biggest government ever known for the Founders, but for progressives it is, because society is government and society "has an organization" that acts. For myself, I agree with the Founders, "we the people" was and is an indictment of government. Government merely gets in the way and only makes things worse.

They have no allegiance to liberal democracy, which they believe has failed the marginalized communities they’re defending. They’re anarchists and communists who are way outside the traditional conservative-liberal spectrum.

Now understand, the phrase "Liberal Democracy", that's not a nod to big government progressives like the Clintons. No, that's aimed squarely at so-called "Classical Liberalism" (The real, only liberalism), That's aimed at the Founding Fathers and any other small government group, effort, individual, or viewpoint. He openly admits that Antifa is communist. That means they want tyranny instead of small government Liberty.

Additionally, Fake Historian Bray also admits to the interviewer his own outlook. "He’s sympathetic to antifa’s cause and makes no effort to hide that."

Mark Bray is making the classic mistake: "This big government group over here is bad, so therefore I must join(or support) the other big government group over there because they are the good guys."

That has never, ever worked. The only time in human history where you see a long-lasting peace, freedom, etc, is with the American Revolution where both sides of the big government equation were rejected, and briefly during the Tea Party movement, which was not centered around one man or big government ideology. Small government was instead fostered. The Constitution was fostered. Republicanism(not the party) was promoted.

There's no question in my mind that Fake Historians and the falsehoods they promote is a bigger problem than Fake News, and this idea that Antifa is somehow the good guys is right up there. If historians told the truth, the Fake News about how great Antifa is couldn't stand. It couldn't possibly work.

Communism and Fascism are inherently evil. It's that simple. A real historian would recognize that.

Tuesday, August 15, 2017

Technically speaking, progressives have had about six different names. I believe that if the progressives ever did change their name again, they would choose the word "technocrat" as their new hiding place. First, for a little background. Note: this is not designed to be an all-encompassing, uncover-every-stone-history lesson.

Starting out, the earliest progressives were known as "Georgists" - that is, Henry George and the publication of the book Progress and Poverty. Note the word "progress" in the title. Georgists were not the uniform statist that we would come to know, starting around the beginning of the 20th century. One of George's primary claims to fame was the Single Tax, but more importantly, what impressed young budding would-be-progressives was his agitation for land nationalization. They absolutely loved that one.

Meeting only limited success, they eventually dropped "Georgist" and adopted the name of "Nationalist", following the success of Edward Bellamy's book Looking Backward. Much more statist than a Georgist, the Nationalists were (and still are) deeply fond of the idea of the nationalization of some or all industry in the hands of government. They had increasing nation-wide popularity, much moreso than under the prior banner.

Around the time when Looking Backward's popularity was waning, there was a lack of unity of what to call themselves. Some progressives decided to be called Populists, and had their own Populist party that again, still, sought greater government intervention. Others simply decided to call themselves "reformer". The populists were even more popular than their prior iteration, even running their own presidential candidate. The Nationalists never got that far and neither did the Georgists.

Finally, right around the turn of the 1900s the word 'progressive' became vogue in all corners of modern statist academia and among pro-big-government activists on the street. The movement that would inevitably become the "progressive movement" again split, this time succeeding in gaining the presidency in Theodore Roosevelt. Another half of progressives coalesced behind Bryan and then later Wilson, the second big-government progressive to become president.

It wouldn't be until the 1930's and Franklin Roosevelt that the progressives had to again take a new title. But this time, they took a new title for a different reason: They had thoroughly scared the crap out of the American people. Americans had seen progressivism in action for what it actually is and not just nebulous propaganda dressed up in cute words over the last two decades, and they were frightened by it. Every prior re-branding of progressivism was "simply" due to a failure to reach critical mass. But now, they were in active camouflage. The progressives were in hiding, they were wearing masks, masquerading in disguise, something they had never really had to do before.

Under the banner of "liberalism", progressives have had nearly a century (from the 1930's to today) to hide their true means and ends. With every prior name change, progressives could pretty much make something up and chart their course forward. But their movement was almost completely destroyed in the 1910's-20's, and this time they took over an already existing label: "liberalism". This label wasn't being used much and it was not the clean slate that they were used to. However, by taking over a previously known moniker, "liberalism", they found themselves gaining a much thicker layer of camouflage than they had expected to receive. It didn't require the kind of marketing that would've been necessary for a wholly new word.

But eventually, that camouflage began to see its disintegration in the mid-late 2000s, leading some prominent progressives to take off their masks and admit that they never were liberals at all - they were progressives all along and had been for decades. One even did so in a presidential debate.

Tody, there is not a unity among progressives as to whether or not they should reclaim the name of 'progressive', or continue to try to stay incognito under the banner of liberalism, or should they follow Bernie's lead?

As I said in the opening, I think progressives might jump ship altogether and go with what is largely a clean slate. That is their history, it's what they've always done. They've never gone back to a name that they had already used in some prior time. Even when they took over the word "liberalism", it was largely a clean slate.

The word "Technocrat" invokes the "good name" of science, and the media has over the years seeded the ground with plenty of good will toward this moniker.

Could lucky number seven - "Technocrat"; Technocracy - could this moniker lead progressives once and for all toward the salvation they've always sought? Only time will tell. The mask of "liberalism" is fading fast, and a widespread return to "progressive" may not provide the relief they are seeking.

About the blog

If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself,
you will succumb in every battle - Sun Tzu (Art of War, Chapter 3)